Family lashes out at Woodstock killer's sentencing

Robinson was offered a deal to plead guilty to manslaughter after his first-degree murder conviction was overturned on appeal

Heather Rivers, Woodstock Sentinel-Review

Updated: March 21, 2018

The family of Clifford Fair feel John Douglas Robinson, 42, being led away by police from the Woodstock courthouse in 2012, is "getting away with murder" after he was sentenced Tuesday March 20 to only two more years in prison for killing Fair. (File photo)

The family of Clifford Fair accused his killer of “getting away with murder” in an emotional victim impact statement Tuesday in a Woodstock courtroom.

John Robinson was sentenced to 15 years in prison, so with time served he will spend another two years in a federal penitentiary after pleading guilty last month to manslaughter.

“The court system has failed to get justice for Clifford,” said Fair’s stepmother Heather Meadows. “This has taken a tremendous toll on our family.”

Robinson has admitted to hitting Fair, who lived in Woodstock, with a padded pipe in 2008 and burying his body in the backyard of Robinson’s Princess Street apartment in Woodstock.

Robinson later dug up the body and dismembered it before reburying it.

Meadows said she and Fair’s mother Pauline Fair of London weren’t consulted before the Oxford Crown’s office offered Robinson a plea deal of manslaughter.

The mothers of Clifford Fair, Heather Meadows, left, and Pauline Fair, say they are heartbroken their son’s killer will spend only two more years in jail. John Robinson pleaded guilty to manslaughter after a conviction of first-degree murder was overturned by the Ontario Court of Appeal. (HEATHER RIVERS/Postmedia Network)

Last summer, the Court of Appeal in Ontario ordered a new trial on the charge of second-degree murder after finding there were errors in the judge’s instruction to jurors in a 2012 trial that resulted in a first-degree murder conviction.

Manslaughter is an unintentional killing, although there may have been an intention to cause harm. Sentences can vary widely.

In 2008, Robinson lived in the apartment with his girlfriend, Amy Gilbert. According to the agreed statement of facts, they were both alcoholics and suffered from mental illness. Their relationship was often turbulent, including Robinson’s 2007 conviction of assaulting Gilbert.

This has taken a tremendous toll on our family.

Heather Meadows

On Sept. 27, 2008, Fair, a casual friend of Gilbert, showed up at the couple’s apartment at around 9 p.m. and began drinking beer with them.

Fair had moved to Woodstock from the Shoal Lake Reserve in Manitoba in 2003.

After drinking for a couple of hours, Robinson decided it was time for Fair to leave, and suggested it several times to Fair, who dismissed the idea. Robinson was worried Fair was cutting into their beer supply and potentially intimate time with his girlfriend.

Robinson also claimed some of his belongings were in Fair’s backpack.

Testimony from Gilbert described Robinson striking Fair, who was much larger than Robinson, from behind with a padded end of an aluminum pipe. After the first blow, Fair started to get up and threatened Robinson, who hit him with the pipe a second time, striking him in the head and shoulder area.

Fair fell backward into a wall and died within moments.

After the death, Robinson told Gilbert he never meant to hurt, much less kill, Fair. Robinson then buried Fair in a shallow grave in their backyard. A day or two later, he dug the body up and dismembered it, burying it in several locations and covering it with quicklime to hide the smell.

Pauline Fair went to police in October 2008, claiming she had not heard from her son since Sept. 18. Fair was listed as missing.

“I have cried almost every day for 10 years since my son didn’t show up that Sunday at my home,” said Fair outside the courtroom.

In November 2008, during a night out at a Woodstock bar, Gilbert confided to a friend that Robinson had killed Fair. Robinson then admitted to killing Fair in a phone call to his ex-wife.

Gilbert and Robinson were arrested on Nov. 12, 2008.

Police uncovered Fair’s head and torso in his backyard but didn’t locate his arms until a year later, after Robinson told them where to look.

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